The Hindu : National : Let House panel probe agrarian crisis: BJP

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Saturday, Sep 09, 2006

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National

Let House panel probe agrarian crisis: BJP

Neena Vyas

National policy, above party considerations, ought to be evolved

DEHRA DUN: The Bharatiya Janata Party on Friday demanded that a joint parliamentary committee be set up to study the agrarian crisis, which is leading suicide by farmers.

Two resolutions adopted by the national executive committee here focussed on problems related to agriculture and price rise.

A national policy, above party considerations, ought to be evolved to deal with the agrarian crisis.

Senior leader M. Venkaiah Naidu, who moved the resolution on the agrarian crisis, said though the Swaminathan Commission produced reports, the Government took no concrete steps. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh visited Vidharbha in Maharashtra two years after assuming office, and the package he announced for the affected farmers was limited. "It was a notional package, not a national package," Mr. Naidu charged.

Reminding the Congress that it had made suicide by farmers a major election issue in 2004, the BJP sought a further reduction in the interest rates on farm loans, medical health insurance and crop insurance, extension of the Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme to all districts, amendment of the Indian Seed Act to place responsibility for quality on suppliers, boosting organic farming and a food-stamp programme to check pilferage and corruption afflicting the public distribution system.

The other resolution, moved by V.K. Malhotra, said the United Progressive Alliance, which had raised the slogan of `aam admi' [the common man] did him grave injustice.

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